An Opportunity to Serve
The lion's share of our property taxes--approximately half--is school tax, going to the Hudson City School District, whose current annual budget is $55.6 million and current enrollment is fewer than 1,600 students. If you are concerned about what's happening in the district, now is an opportunity to join the HCSD Board of Education. There are three open seats on the board, and the period for gathering signatures on petitions to get on the ballot is happening now. The following information appears on the HCSD website.
The Hudson City School District Board of Education has three board member seats up for election this year. Those seats, which expire on June 30, 2025, are held by Willette Jones, Mark DePace, and Lakia Walker.
Each seat is a three-year term, beginning on July 1, 2025. Board members are sworn in at the Organizational Meeting which happens within the first seven business days in July.
Each board member is also expected to serve on a committee. There are usually three members on each committee. We have the following committees:
- Policy Committee--Meets once or twice a month a 5 p.m. before the board meeting
- Audit Committee--Meets quarterly (one member is required to be the board president)
- Facilities Committee--Meets monthly at 4 p.m. usually the day of the board meeting
There is required onboarding training called New Board Member Training through NYSSBA [New York State School Boards Association] that the district pays for. It can either be virtual or in-person. There is no out-of-pocket cost to the board member. Mileage is reimbursed.
Here is the link to NYSSBA where you can get more information on the training. Here is a link to get more information on being a board member.
For current board meeting activity, please check out Hudson's BoardDocs page.
Petitions can be picked up from the Board Clerk on business days between 8:30 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. Interested candidates should call ahead, as the clerk's lunch time varies. Proof of residency is required.
Numbers that would be interesting to know:
ReplyDelete1. How much are HCSD board members paid per year?
2. What is the total cost per student within HCSD to the tax payer? (Spoiler alert, it is more than private school tuition)
3. What percentage of students are admitted to top 100 Colleges, what percentage of those students get merit or need based scholarships?
4. What is the average salary of an HCSD graduate at 30? How does that compare to their peers in the other 3 Columbia County school districts?
5 What percentage of humans over 18 on campus and paid HCSD do not actively teach but "administer", landscape, do "security" etc.?
6. What is the average SAT score, and what is the distribution? Related, what percentage of HCSD students do not even take the SAT or ACT?
7. Name students who have achieved any national accolade that is objective and ranked, not participation trophies or inflated grades by local teachers.
Of course it is "racist" to ask these questions... if you listen to Kamal or Tom.... but in reality... HCSD is a moral failing that disproportionally impacts the working poor and kids who had no choice in being born or raised here.
8) Administrators to teacher ratio compared with national average
Delete9) Median administrative salary compared to area media income
With declining enrollment (national trend) we should combine all the county school districts administratively into one. It’s ridiculous to have a superintendent and administration for each singular set of elementary/middle/high schools. Most states do it by the county.
I'm with you, FNI, I would absolutely love to know what value I am getting for the $11,500 (that is NOT a typo) that I must now send annually to the school board. (with another $11,500 in real estate tax) As a single mom, and a working artist, with a recent college graduate son (from a college ranked 54th in the US, after a combo of public school in out last town, and private in ATL with a price tag similar to Hudson's cost of education), I am horrified by this number, given what I just read in US News and world report.
DeleteIf they are accurate, "Hudson City School District spends $28,265 per student each year. It has an annual revenue of $54,441,000. Overall, the district spends $18,020.2 million on instruction, $8,432.3 million on support services and $486.9 million on other expenses."
The high school ranks 575th in NYS (from 1-661 by test scores).
So I am personally paying about half the costs of educating one child, in a town with 5000+ residents, and 1600 students. Now you know why I intend to leave. Who can afford to live here? I am fortunate enough to own my home, thanks to a wise and lucky real estate investment 22 year ago, but I can't afford to stay here.To think I left a small village by the ocean, with a better school (ranked 142nd), where my combined tax burden was $7000, not $25,000 annually.
Don't get me wrong, I value education more than the average American. My aunt and grandmother were both teachers. My parents sacrificed enormously to educate me. I believe it is the ONLY thing you can give a child that can never be taken away. So I would not complain at all if I thought my tax was fairly assessed and put to good use, but I know I am paying more than average Hudson resident, thanks to the "newcomers tax" (which I see every time I go to pay the bill), and I know Hudson schools are under performing in the state. None of this makes sense to me.
Add this to the list of broken systems that need reform, not by the Trump/Musk clown show, but by regular people, paying attention, who have had enough. I wish I had the means to stay here and fight for this, but I'm not rich enough to stay.
Tanya - this is so unfair.
DeleteAnd this is *exactly* Kamal's plan for Hudson.
Raise taxes on all the Tanya's as high as possible... and then he and his friends / girlfriends / campaign managers live in Galvan or other subsidized housing and never feel the pain of high property taxes directly, and then squander other people's money.
If these people really cared about student success they would consolidate as you suggest Union Jack... imagine how many more math teachers they can hire with the savings... of 4-8 $250k a year administrator... or they could lower school taxes which will enable less rich families to move here.
ReplyDeleteIt's not that parents and teachers don't care; it's that they don't KNOW. At the heart of HCSD's dysfunction is the top-down ignorance about how to create -- and run -- a good school system. Such knowledge is all around: I have been writing about schools overcoming the goblins of poverty and demographics for years. It ain't money and it ain't DEI. The two most important ingredients of such success stories (where 70% of kids are reading above grade level instead of below: 1) a written, taught, and tested curriculum, 2) a disciplined classroom environment that allows (encourages) the teaching and learning of such a curriculum. It ain't rocket science, folks. And it certainly doesn't require $30+K per student. --peter meyer
ReplyDeleteFixing the failing and overly expensive school system should be the number one priority for Hudson's politicians, but I never hear a peep about it.
ReplyDeleteUnder state law, municipal governments don’t have any control over their school districts. The only exceptions are the big five cities.
DeleteThe state has a good data site for quick and easy numbers:
ReplyDeletehttps://data.nysed.gov/profile.php?instid=800000053704
As of last year, enrollment was 1,522 and expenditures per pupil $30,772. Almost top in the state in spending and near the bottom in results.
Nothing short of some drastic changes will change this trend. They’ll keep raising taxes the max amount per year (~2%) and it’s death by a thousand cuts.
And just like the city’s budget and taxes, it’s going to be a situation where the middle class keeps getting driven out by high costs and little results. Thus being replaced by the rich who can pay the tax and also pay for their own private services and schools.
Exactly Jack.
DeleteNow add to your $30k estimate the average cost of a "youth" at the Youth Center... that takes part year-round, not just the summer program... depending on which number we should believe... $5k to $15k per student. (Calvin, please let us know if you and the Director disagree on this number)
Then add the cost per student from Kite's Nest, Peter Frank's Friends of Hudson Youth ($250k p.a.), and the Promise Neighborhood, Spark is now also spending money on this... and then you easily get to $40k plus... conservatively.
The whole is less than the sum of its parts.
For $1k you can send a Southern African youth to a ways better school than HCSD. But sure... Black Lives Matter... because we painted it on Warren Street.
Note that HCSD used to be more successful in the 90s, and 2000s, and that this is not the fault of individual teachers but the political leaders and parents who deny reality.
Throwback to when Kamal attempted to disprove HCSD's total failure by leveraging a single student's HCSD report card. (Not any objective measure, not a larger sample, proving Roland Fryer's entire thesis).
Grading your own students without objective national tests is like a restaurant giving itself five-star reviews on Yelp while refusing to let health inspectors in the kitchen.
It might make the menu look great, but you have no idea if the food is actually edible.
2% a year increase? Ha! Mine went up 120%, in a single year, thanks to a re-assessment. I call it the newcomers tax, but not for developers of course.... And I DID have a typo...I'm paying over $25K total, so that's $12,500 for the schools alone, not $11,500. as I said above. $25K for a 3000 sq ft duplex in which I live in half, and did not have the foresight to write a triple net lease for my tenant, because I had no idea this could or would happen (thanks, Sotheby's realtors).
DeleteStunning.
DeleteKamal (who should be a volunteer mayor like his predecessors, or the current leaders of Ghent/Kinderhook with the same honorarium as council members) now makes almost 4x your local taxes in salary for a non FT job... that used to pay 5x less when the Hudson population was larger.
If you count him and Michelle (Housing Justice Director) as a "household" then they make 8x (~$160k, not including benefits) directly from Hudson tax payers.
And he has roughly the same or more square footage in his Galvan house (in the 1st Ward) as you do in your non-subsidized house in the 4th Ward.
Tanya - why don't you run for mayor on the platform of just redistributing the Mayor's salary to everyone who got nailed with the very likely unlawful "Welcome Neighbor" tax.
https://www.nytimes.com/1989/04/11/nyregion/our-towns-howdy-stranger-have-a-big-dose-of-realty-taxes.html
Yes, Tanya, 2% mil rate increase. It’s the same sleight of hand the city plays with tax increases. What they don’t announce publicly is their unspoken policy of “welcome stranger” assessments which are managed by the city, even though it also determines your school tax. This is how the Mayor brags about raising taxes only a little here and there, but greatly increasing city spending year to year. The mil rate goes up only 1-3%, but they unfairly assess new residents by 100-200% higher, thus shouldering the burden on those who haven’t yet figured out the political landscape. Also add in hidden taxes like the upcoming sidewalk fee or upping the water/sewer bill way over inflation, as well as unrealized burdens we’ve yet to see from handing out PILOTs like candy to their favorite developer/landlords, and raiding the reserve fund… you see where this is going.
DeleteThis is also why the mayor and Tom have vehemently avoided a citywide reassessment, while the state recommends fair value updates annually. Once the tax rolls are rebalanced then the rest of the taxpayers will feel the pain of their financial malpractice. It’s the big hot potato they hope pass on to the next administration once they’re safely in Albany, Missouri or wherever. The next mayor and council will get blamed for it since property taxes are more complicated than the average citizen can handle.
Another example of why a city manager would be helpful — They would hire and manage the assessor to follow best practices and use property value trending to value everyone fairly on an annual basis. Instead of the current system that illegally favors longtime residents over newcomers, snowballing into a politically unpopular chore that must be done once the state equalization rate becomes too punitive.
I'm torn between fighting and leaving, but leaning towards leaving. I've been fighting old boy networks in life and work my entire life, and I'm just tired of it. If I had known about this 'welcome stranger' tax, I'd probably never have come here. It burns even more, knowing deep pocketed developers are incentivized to come here because of the rebates and exemptions they get. As owner of one small building, do I really pay more tax than Galvan? Because if so, that would sicken me.
DeleteAnd don't even get me started on the water/sewer issue. My aunt finally said 'enough' on this issue after decades of simply paying the bill in her small town. She took on the robbery of the utility and WON! Here in Hudson, my building is charged DOUBLE because I'm in a mixed use building with a half bath in the commercial part. So my commercial tenant pays the same rate as any other residential unit in Hudson. How many of these exist on Warren St? I'll guess EVERY SINGLE BUILDING. A single, small, half bathroom in a commercial space getting charged the full rate, same as a 2-4BA home or apartment.
In my aunt's case, she was fighting for a building with 30 units being charged as if it was 30 single family homes. I'm so proud of her for fighting, because she single- handedly forced the laws in her state to be re-written, saved countless landlords and tenants countless millions of dollars going forward, and forced the local water/sewer utility to stop these little financial sleights of hand that have been going on for too long.
I'd be curious to know if the 64 units at the Hudson Dept lofts are going to be charged as 64 individual units, but I guess that all depends who is getting the bill.....the developer or the tenant. I'd love to know if anyone has an answer there. But if they are not, then why are my 2 units charged individually, and not based on building usage.
I think these reassessments need to happen sooner rather than later, and I'd like to know why Kamal and Tom oppose them. And where is all this increased spending going? It's all so deeply frustrating, and I suppose that is by design.
Tanya - why don't you run on the platform of getting Tom + Kamal (jointly known as Tomal) to be honest about taxes and do the right thing this year;
DeleteFreeze the budget, do a town wide and transparent tax re-assessment during their own term, and find other ways to save you money.
The only reason Kamal won the one election he has ever won as mayor is because it was right after the previous honorable mayor did a fair tax reassessment.
re: Hudson Lofts. I can't keep all the public housing and subsidizing housing, and PILOT enabled housing straight...
But part of the problem is that we the tax payers subsidize Galvan with tax breaks... and then well intentioned folks like Spark pay off old housing debts of only some segment of the population.
This way you now have to sell your house and leave literally due to housing affordability, but the residents who have not paid their subsidized rent for years get to stay forever.
Would love for Tomal, Caitie from Spark, and Peter Frank from the Youth Center to explain to us the moral case for extracting maximum taxes from retired middle class residents on fixed incomes and subsidizing younger residents who do not work.
Because that is Kamal's platform right now, and it is un-American.
“subsidizing younger residents who do not work.“ haha wow— yes, we call them children, Hugo.
DeleteDavid - no one is asking children (residents under 18) to work. I was referring to non-retired working age residents. Though of course the successful ones who get out obviously do work at 16 and beyond.
DeleteI was also referring to elected politicians in town who are in their 30s and claim they can't afford an apartment when they have not held down a full-time job for several years.
Everyone wants lower cost of housing... we are simply pointing out that if we lower property taxes everyone's housing costs will go down. This is fairer and more data driven... than jacking the property taxes of newcomers (potentially illegal, and the source of a new lawsuit against Kamal) and hardworking homeowners to subsidize a ballooning of subsidized housing that does not contribute equally to public services.
What is your idea David to make housing more affordable for all in Hudson? And do you believe Hudson's housing market is different than other similar towns?
oh and just checked... Kite's Nest and Spark of Hudson offer "teen employment"...
DeleteThere is not a single 2 square mile in all of Africa with as many opportunities as in the City of Hudson, NY.
Vote no on the budget then.
ReplyDeleteThe numbers can always be looked at a second time and should be.
That’s thin gruel: if the budget fails then the “plan b” budget is automatically enacted — and it’s the same as the voted on budget. Does it get more cynical than that? That’s why no one votes in HCSD budget votes — it’s pointless and time consuming to no good end.
DeleteYeah, the school budget vote is always an exercise in self defeat. Every year I vote, like Charlie Brown and the football, they always yank it on me ðŸ˜
DeleteLet them reach the austerity budget. It has happened in the past. Parents had to fund programs and raise money for sports etc AND IT WAS ACCOMPLISHED.
ReplyDeleteI’m not against education but I am against being bled dry.
Their “austerity budget” is a joke and basically a tactic to hold popular programs hostage. How about they cut a few of the six figure administrators
Delete